Taking the Local Plan forward

Over the past two days, AudlemOnline has featured Cheshire East's much awaited Local Plan which is now going forward for final approval by key Council committees.

Yesterday, we published the list of proposed development sites to meet Cheshire East's 5-year supply of housing, the vital figure which will affect planning applications over the coming years.

So, what happens next, and what might the impact be on current applications, including the two big ones in Audlem?

Process

First, the document will be published for a six week period to invite further representations on the 'soundness' and legal compliance of the plan and these will be logged and sent to the Planning Inspectorate prior to Examination.

The document will then be formally submitted to the Secretary of State who will appoint an independent Planning Inspector to examine the legal compliance and soundness of the plan document.

The Examination process starts immediately after the plan is submitted. The Inspector will consider all the submitted written material including the representations and will decide which matters are discussed at the Examination hearing sessions.

These sessions will be led by the Inspector, bringing in the Council and other participants to fully explore the matters, issues and questions that the Inspector wants answers to. However, formal cross-examination of participants by legal advocates will not normally take place.

Those persons or organisations that submit formal objections requesting changes to the Cheshire East Local Plan Strategy – Submission Version within the prescribed six week period will have the right to appear before and be heard by the Inspector.

However, the Inspector is not precluded from inviting anyone to appear and be heard at a hearing where he thinks that person is needed to enable the soundness of the Plan to be determined.

It is anticipated that the Examination will commence in the summer of 2014 with the Inspector's Report expected towards the end of the year.

The Inspector's main concern is to establish whether the plan is legally compliant and 'sound'. The Council can suggest minor modifications to improve the plan that do not affect soundness. If the Inspector considers the plan would be unsound without more major modifications being made, these will need to be consulted upon (normally six weeks) and the representations reported to the Inspector before the Examination is concluded.

Audlem's planning applications

So, will the Plan be taken into account with Audlem's two major planning applications in Little Heath (upto 120 homes) and Heathfield Road/Mill Lane (now 26 homes, reduced from 36 in the original application)?

The Plan includes a 'Vision for Local Service Centres' such as Audlem. It says:

"In the Local Service Centres, some modest growth in housing and employment will have taken place to meet local objectively assessed needs, to reduce the level of out-commuting and to secure their continuing vitality. This may require small scale alterations to the Green Belt in some circumstances."

Last July, the leader of Cheshire East, told Audlem Parish Council that "the draft Local Plan is for around seventy new properties in all over twenty years in Audlem", a figure clearly less than the Gladman application at Little Heath on its own.

Now, if common sense were the dominant consideration, and taking that Vision into account, all major planning application hearings in Local Service Centres such as Audlem would be suspended until the Plan was confirmed by the Planning Inspectorate. That would mean major housing development took place in accordance with the plans laid out by the democratically elected council. Which sounds eminently sensible.

Unfortunately, two considerations may precede 'common sense':

• Property developers such as Gladman are deliberately exploiting a loophole in the planning process by flooding the country with applications particularly focussed where Local Plans are not yet complete, which is in about half of council areas in England.
• Lawyers, and this ultimately will be settled by legal argument, are generally not interested in 'sensible' solutions. Their objective is to win the argument for their client and collect their fees. (If any lawyers wish to dispute this view, we will happily publish their argument).

Appeal

The Little Heath application went to Appeal by the Planning Inspectorate last year – well before the latest version of the Local Plan was published. As a complication, a second version of this application is still awaiting consideration by Cheshire East. So it will be interesting to see if the 5-Year housing supply in this Plan will be accepted as a relevant argument, particularly as the Plan is not scheduled to be finally approved until later in the year, almost certainly after the Gladman appeal is heard, which we understand is likely to be in May.

The revised Hockenhull application, now for 26 properties to the north of Mill Lane and off Heathfield Road (it was originally 36 properties to the north and south of Mill Lane) has yet to be heard by Cheshire East's Strategic Planning Board who rejected the earlier 36 property application in October last year.

Here, the timings are so different to Little Heath that the chances of the Local Plan affecting the ultimate decision will be much higher but, we guess, those arguments are all being considered by both developers and the council, and their respective lawyers, as we write this.

It's just a pity that common sense is unlikely to be the final winner. But, who knows, we may be surprised.

This article is from our news archive. As a result pictures or videos originally associated with it may have been removed and some of the content may no longer be accurate or relevant.